It happens every Sunday during football season. You sit down on your couch with beer in one hand, remote in the other, mentally and physically prepared for a day filled with pigskin pleasure. 

 

But then your enjoyment is shattered by a relentless screech from your television that attacks your eardrums late into the evening.

 

It’s the car wreck called the Mainstream Media (MSM) and their ignorant acolytes, the “pundits.” And they’re back in full force for the 2006 NFL season, doing their best to erode your enjoyment of every blessed football event. 

 

In their constant struggle to top the competition and grab a larger slice of the NFL cash cow, mainstream networks, newspapers and Web sites commit significant resources to “pundits” who value volume over validity, ignorance over insight and fallacies over Cold, Hard Football Facts.

 

This season on Cold, Hard Football Facts.com, Pigskin Detention will document the cavalcade of clowns from TV, the Internet, newspapers and any other outlet that provides lazy, uninformed sports coverage. We’ll keep tabs on national networks, specialty shows, local talking heads and pretty much whatever comes from the keyboard of Pete Prisco.

 

Something tells us we’ll be busy.

 

One of the longstanding September traditions among the “pundits” is to wildly overreact to the first game of the season.

 

Week 1 last year brought us snap reactions such as Bill Plaschke of "Around the Horn" telling the world that the Chiefs, following a 27-7 win over the Jets, were a Super Bowl contender because of their defense. The mighty Jets, of course, would end the season with a 4-12 record and one of the worst offenses in football (15.0 PPG). Kansas City’s Super Bowl-caliber defense surrendered 318 points in the next 15 games (21.2 PPG), and the Chiefs didn’t even make the playoffs.

 

Meanwhile, Ron Jaworski, normally a Cold, Hard Football Facts favorite, proclaimed that the Patriots would not miss former coordinators Romeo Crennel and Charlie Weis – even though he had seen only one game, a 30-20 win over Oakland, one of the worst teams in football. The New England defense went into the tank over the next 10 weeks (26.9 PPG), while the offense failed to live up to its 2004 standards. The season ended with the franchise’s first playoff loss since 1998.

 

This year is no different. With the NFL and NCAA seasons just under way, it’s high time for a plate of overreaction with a heaping side of hyperbole. Nibble on these little appetizers of ignorance:

 

“If the Seattle Seahawks make the playoffs, that could be the play of the year … This one maybe saved Seattle's season.” – Sterling Sharpe, NBC, on a fourth-quarter reception by Darrell Jackson

Sharpe might earn an express ticket into the Overreaction Hall of Fame for this one. Calling a first-down reception in the first game of the year against one of the worst teams in football a play that “saved” the season is a stretch even for this bunch. Gumby would be proud.

 

“They have not proven since losing Edgerrin James that they can run the ball.” – John Madden, NBC, early in the second quarter of the Indy-N.Y. Giants game.

 

Joseph Addai and Dominic Rhodes had approximately 17 minutes to establish the run in Madden’s eyes … and they failed. Even the O.J. jury took more time to return a verdict.

“All those Chiefs fans who ripped me to shreds this spring when I wrote that Steven Jackson would lead the league in rushing, what do you think now? The Chiefs fans insisted Larry Johnson would be the rushing champ. Jackson ran for 121 yards against the Broncos, while Johnson had 68 against the Bengals.” – Pete Prisco, Sportsline.com

 

Allow us to speak for Chiefs fans everywhere and anyone else who might think it’s idiotic to gloat about your preseason pick for the rushing title after Week 1: Pipe down, Pete. We’ve got 15 games to go. Hey, wait a minute. Aren’t you the same spineless wuss who refused to debate the Cold, Hard Football Facts two years ago? Maybe that explains your need to celebrate the little victories in your life.

“With the Lions scoring six points and totaling just 251 yards of total offense, it's difficult to see how Detroit is so much more explosive with Mike Martz as offensive coordinator. That used to be a decent quarter for Martz in St. Louis.” – Don Banks, SI.com

 

It’s difficult to see because it was one game out of a 16-game season – a game played against the defending NFC champion. Now, Martz may turn out to be a massive bust – like everything else in Detroit over the last 50 years, from the Edsel to Matt Millen. But judging Martz based upon one game is the equivalent of concluding that Don Banks shouldn’t have his own column after reading the first four lines of his article. It takes at least a few paragraphs to come to that conclusion.

 

As for the proficiency of Martz-led teams in the first quarter – it was actually a pretty bad quarter for St. Louis last year. The Rams scored 123 points in the second quarter, 113 in the fourth and just 67 in the first. Hey, at least it was better than their third-quarter point total (54). By the way, 15 teams scored more first-quarter points than St. Louis last year.

 

 “They’re a little bit like the Dallas Cowboys were built in their heyday. I don’t want to make these guys into Troy Aikman, Emmitt Smith and Michael Irvin – but they’re trying to be like that with the receiver, quarterback and tailback in place.” – Steve Mariucci, NFL Network, on the Miami Dolphins

 

Those Cowboys of the 1990s revolutionized football when they employed that wildly creative strategy of fielding a good quarterback, receiver and tailback. Nobody in the history of football had ever thought of that before. Cheers to Miami coach Nick Saban for rediscovering this secret to success. Jeers to Mariucci for comparing Daunte Culpepper (two playoff victories), Ronnie Brown (937 career rushing yards) and Chris Chambers (one 1,000-yard season) to one of the most successful offensive trios in NFL history. It's that kind of football analysis that led San Francisco to its first losing season in 17 years (4-12 in 1999) and got Mariucci fired in the middle of last season after a 15-28 mark in Detroit.

 

“The Chargers have a difference-maker at tight end and, no, I’m not talking about Antonio Gates. I’m talking about Brandon Manumaleuna. This guy is going to help them in the passing game.” – Michael Smith, NFL Live

 

Make no mistake, Manumaleuna is a force in the passing game. Look at these numbers: 66 receptions, 648 yards receiving, 6 TDs … Wait, those are his career numbers. And he’s played since 2001. There’s a reason the Rams cut this bum loose and filled his spot with two rookies. He’s not very good.

 

“If you watched this game and never looked at the scoreboard, you would say the Giants had won the game and that’s why the Giants came out of this better off than the Colts.” – Bob Ryan, "Around the Horn"

 

It’s perfectly within reason to say that a team outplayed its opponent in a loss. However, reason gets tossed out the window and run over by a Mack truck when you say a team with high hopes that is 0-1 after suffering a home loss is “better off” than the team that is 1-0 with a quality road win under its belt.

 

“You don’t have to be a football analyst to understand this.” – Cris Collinsworth on the “Manning Bowl”

 

And you also don’t have to be a football analyst to understand football – though most analysts would vehemently dispute that.

 

“(Larry Johnson) is this year’s MVP.” – Sean Salisbury, June 2006

“I think (Tom Brady) is going to be the MVP of the league this year.” – Sean Salisbury, September 2006

Two down, 414 MVP candidates to go.

 

“The rest of the slate from here on out should provide some mild amusement and perhaps even token conflict. But it will also be anticlimactic, because if all goes according to form, No. 1 Ohio State will play the winner of the Nov. 25 USC-Notre Dame clash in the national championship game on Jan. 8.” – Michael Ventre, msnbc.com

 

So Ventre believes a late November battle that pits two traditional powerhouses and longtime hated rivals in a fight for a spot in the national title game will be “anticlimactic.” Hey, it’s been, what – a whole year? – since USC-Notre Dame played a decent game anyway.

 

Ventre also goes out on a limb by saying “if all goes according to form,” he’s confident that two of the current top four teams in the nation will play in the national championship game. Ballsy pick.

 

It was Thursday night, and millions of men and women all over the country were oozing testosterone (yeah, that’s right, women ooze testosterone, too) waiting for the opening of the 2006 NFL season in Pittsburgh. NBC was back in the spotlight for its first NFL broadcast after years of being forced to show bull riding opposite the nation’s most popular sport. 

 

After all the years, all the hype, all the pregame shows, it was finally time for some real football.

 

Cue up the kick-ass, testosterone-fueled NBC intro starring … Pink?

 

Yeah, Pink. 

 

An anti-establishment (and only mildly attractive) female “rocker” with pink hair was the best NBC could come up with to accompany their opening montage for the NFL kickoff.

 

As out of place as Pink’s appearance seemed, it was merely an example of a common and spreading phenomenon – the football opening montage. 

 

Somewhere along the line, it was mandated by the pigskin powers that be that all big games must be preceded by a video montage of intertwined highlights with lame musicians providing the soundtrack. Thursday it was Pink. Saturday on ESPN College GameDay, it was Big and Rich blaring “We’re coming … to your city” for the 5,000th time. For Monday Night Football, it was staple Hank Williams Jr. – but with his new sidekicks, Cheap Trick and Little Richard. 

 

Take a look at that lineup:

- Pink

- Big and Rich

- Little Richard

- Cheap Trick

 

Someone out there really has a finger on the pulse of football nation. Frankly, we’re not going to be satisfied until Journey and REO Speedwagon get in on the action. 

 

Manning Mania by the Numbers
Family Members – 5
Commercials – 6
Archie Manning pre- and post-game TV appearances – 6 (that we know of)

Shots of the Manning family during Sunday's game – 876,675

Manning family home video clips during Sunday's game – way too friggin' many
Ridiculous comments (that we documented) – 3

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